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Organizers say they have collected enough signatures to put a second Walmart-related issue on the Sioux Falls municipal ballot next spring.

The Save Our Neighborhood group behind the petition drive is challenging the City Council’s decision to rezone land at 85th Street and South Minnesota Avenue from agricultural to commercial to accommodate Walmart. They think the residential neighborhood is a poor fit for a 180,000-square-foot, 24-hour supercenter.

“Let’s let the citizens of Sioux Falls vote,” group spokeswoman Dana Palmer said. “They do not want the area to turn into 41st and Louise. They don’t want a fourth Walmart. They do want smarter planning and smarter growth.”

There are two Walmarts in Sioux Falls. The company’s plan to build a third on the north side of town has met no opposition, but the South Minnesota Avenue proposal is a different story.

“We continue to receive positive feedback and hear excitement about the new store from people throughout Sioux Falls,” Walmart spokeswoman Delia Garcia said in a statement Friday. “The petitions turned in today don’t change that. We think shoppers in Sioux Falls are looking for more options for their everyday shopping needs, and we are confident voters will see the need for this new store should the issue appear on their ballot.”

The clerk’s office said they turned in 6,362 signatures Friday. They’ll need 5,089 to get on the April 8 municipal ballot — 5 percent of the registered voters in the city.

She and Bonita Schwan brought their basket of papers to the clerk’s window ahead of the 5 p.m. deadline.

In the past 60 years, the city has had four referendum votes, where citizens challenged the city council’s decision and put it to the people to decide. Arends said it’s telling that two have come up in the past six months. Schwan said they’ve been hearing from people that their elected officials aren’t listening to them.

“They will come out and vote their voice,” Schwan said.

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Arends said the city as a whole is concerned about the issue, not just those in their neighborhood.

“I think that speaks to the support we have,” she said. “People demand smart growth in the city.”

The group had 20 days to file the petitions since the council’s 7-1 vote.

A yes vote would mean the council’s decision stands and the land will be rezoned to accommodate Walmart’s plans. A no vote would mean the land could not be zoned under the specific sort of commercial zoning Walmart officials had requested.

That might not preclude the store from using a different commercial or industrial zoning designation, said Jeff Schmitt, chief planning and zoning official. City attorney Dave Pfeifle said officials would have to look closely at those options when the time comes.

Save Our Neighborhood members were out gathering signatures until about 3 p.m. Friday, hoping to bolster their numbers. They want to be sure they have collected more than the required number of names in case some are rejected during the city’s validation process.

Clerk’s office staff will make sure the forms were filled out properly, that signers provided all of the required information and that they live within the city limits. From there, a random sampling of the names will be checked against the voter rolls to make sure they are registered voters.

Based on other petitions filed this year, it could be two to three weeks before the validation process is complete.

“We don’t have a timeline, but we do make it a priority,” City Clerk Lorie Hogstad said.

With the other measures, about 1,500 signatures were thrown out each time.

Save Our Neighborhood earlier this year collected enough signatures to challenge the adoption of the city’s new planning and zoning rules known as Shape Places.

Under those rules, the city would ease requirements for developers, requiring fewer conditional-use permits. Save Our Neighborhood organizers said that means the public would have less say over what can be built where.

Palmer said people are much more informed about their cause this time around because they’ve been vocal about it for a while. The rezoning issue also is easier to explain than the Shape Places ordinance, she said.

Last time around, the group gathered more than 6,500 signatures, and the referendum was approved for the ballot.